Empanelment in a Resident Teaching Practice: A Cornerstone to Improving Resident Outpatient Education and Patient Care

Background  Improving continuity is challenging in residency training practices. Studies have shown that empanelment enables high-performing primary care and is foundational to improve accountability and continuity. Objective  An empanelment process was created in a large, urban, residency training practice as an effective approach to enhancing continuity among residents and their patients. Methods  In 2016, we formed an empanelment committee that included stakeholders from the department of medicine, the internal medicine residency program, and hospital and IT leadership. This committee set goal panel sizes, selected an empanelment algorithm, determined which patients needed re-empanelment, and facilitated medical record integration. Empanelment was followed and reassessed quarterly for 2 years. We measured anticipated visit demand using visits in the prior year and continuity using the continuity for physician formula. Results  Of 18 495 active patients in July 2016, 8411 (45%) were assigned a new PCP in the empanelment process. At baseline, panel sizes and expected visit demand were highly variable among residents (from 40 to 107 and 120 to 480, respectively). Empanelment led to more equivalent panel sizes and expected visit demand across same year residents (eg, PGY-3: 80–100 and 320–440, respectively). Continuity for all PCPs in the practice improved from 63% before empanelment to over 80% after empanelment, and improved from 55% to 72% for individual residents. Conclusions  In a large and complex practice environment, we were able to empanel resident clinic patients to improve continuity and maintain it over 2 years.